


Politically Incorrect

by unknowableroom_archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-23
Updated: 2011-09-23
Packaged: 2019-01-19 06:23:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12404802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unknowableroom_archivist/pseuds/unknowableroom_archivist
Summary: An obsession with an older man. A secret relationship. A scandalous friendship. The allure of dark magic and pain of dirty secrets from wizarding history. This story follows 6th year Gryffindor Morgan Vence in her trip from simple trouble-maker to outsider to full-blown rebel. Love is now a game, morality simply a fun thought-experiment and life just a formality.





	1. Prolog

**Author's Note:**

> Note from ChristyCorr, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Unknowable Room](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Unknowable_Room), a Harry Potter archive active from 2005-2016. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project after May 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Unknowable Room collection profile](http://www.archiveofourown.org/collections/unknowableroom).

  
Author's notes: 1  


* * *

The silence in the living room of Number 12 Grimmauld Place was unfitting, to say the most. The celebrations were somewhere in the past and in the future. This particular moment was trapped in the dusty backstage of life.  Severus Snape put down his cup. He thanked them for understanding his secrecy, he reassured them that he forgave them for their mistrust. The war was over. It was exhilarating but it was bitter, and everyone in the quiet room shifted that uncomfortable taste around in their mouth. Lupin, Tonks, Fred, Moody…Was this the time to mourn their deaths? Was it already time to start rebuilding? Thinking about the future was nauseating and their minds slithered and oozed, trying so hard to focus as Snape explained his plans.  He insisted that he could never have a normal life after the role he played, surely they understood. He had to disappear. He will keep in touch, of course. There was nothing left to say. He stood up and walked out.  
  
A blond, pale 17 year old girl shocked them out of their awkward stupor. She had jumped up and knocked over her chair, but stood still in mid movement for the briefest of seconds. This was not a moment of hesitation, for she wasn't looking at anyone in the room or showing signs of an inner struggle. She was preparing herself, and after a split second she bolted after Snape through the dark doorway. George almost stood up but then paused in half-movement. Mrs. Weasly and Hermione exchanged confused glances, mirroring eachother's look of permanent worry. Morgan didn’t care, she could think of nothing but Snape’s presence. She had to get to him.  
  
“You’re leaving?” It was flat and pointless, but the words weren’t what mattered  
  
Snape’s hand was on its way to the doorknob. He turned away from it reluctantly.  
  
Morgan’s face was hidden in shadow. Her form was frozen like that of a frightened cat, aggressive and provoking. As always, she was saying so much by saying nothing.  
  
“I’m sorry, Morgan.”  
  
She didn’t move.  He felt his muscles contract in an attempt to move closer to her, to show her that he…what? No. He stayed where he was, aware of the space between them most acutely, not knowing how to breach it.  
  
“You’re just leaving me here?” Her voice didn’t tremble, it didn’t accuse. Instead it felt more like a punch in the face.  
  
“I know…” Snape answered quietly. He turned to the door.  
  
“FUCK YOU!” A vase smashed into a thousand little pieces mere centimeters from his face. A few bits landed on his cloak. His ears were ringing, and his heart was racing, but he did not move. Slowly, Snape brushed off the glass splinters fom his shoulder. He knew what he would see if he turned to her: a raging animal furious at being abandoned. She wasn’t one to cry. Instead, she would destroy until it made her feel alive again. He knew her, so he did not turn around or say any parting words. Snape let the door creak shut behind him and breathed in the cold fresh air.  
  
Morgan slid down the wall and slammed her fist into the floor. The stinging helped only a little and as the minutes dragged on and the tears never came, she got bored of sitting in the dust. Back in the kitchen, she walked past the massive table in the living room with her head held high, but her eyes avoiding all worried and curious glances. She vaguely heard some questions aimed at her and quickened her pace. She was trembling and her temples were pounding. “Morgan…” George’s voice echoed somewhere in the background, “Don’t tell me you were sleeping with _Snape_!”  
  
Morgan twisted around to him, she was on fire. “No!” she yelled, suddenly feeling the heavy truth of this word, “I didn’t...” Then she could do nothing but disappear upstairs in shame.  



	2. Chapter 1 Distortion

  
It was a Sunday, three in the morning and about a month before Morgan would start her 6th year in Hogwarts. At that precise moment, the pink-haired girl could be found rummaging frantically through cupboards in the upstairs rooms of Number 12 Grimmauld Place.  Dealing with books that could literally bite your fingers off and ashtrays that could explode upon contact requires some caution, a luxury Morgan had no time for. She had created quite a scandal when she forbade Mrs. Weasley to clean out the top floor and being open about her intension to actually use whatever was stashed up there was not part of her plan. All the energy she would have to direct towards making up convincing arguments about preserving heritage etc.  would be wasted quite unnecessarily considering what else she needed to accomplish.  
  
“ _Fuck!_ ” the girl swore as her wand slipped out of her hand and rolled under a nearby armchair. Apart from the thin strip of light coming from underneath the filthy fabric covering that cursed bit of furniture, she had no light. Moving the massive armchair would wake the entire household, a completely undesirable turn of events. She plopped down on the floor and sighed. Nonchalantly looking the other way, she reached out her hand. The wand rolled back and jumped into her awaiting palm. She then dutifully promised herself that she will never do that again, it was just that she had no other way out of this situation. Wandless magic was freaky and she didn’t know where it came from. No one knew the logic behind it and Morgan was not an idiot to take candy from strangers. Besides, she was pretty good with a wand, so there was really no need to raise eyebrows with wandless tricks. She liked the feeling of the wand mediating between the magic and her environment. It was safer this way, she was sure. It was cleaner. Who knows what her mind would do if the wand wasn’t there to guide it?  
  
She resumed her search, which consisted of carefully levitating objects from the top of a ragged old book, the title of which could still be read off its side: “Distortion Magic. History and Use”. Who would have thought that a summer-long search of every single wizarding bookstore in the whole of Europe would lead her to the room above her bedroom. Even the shadiest of stores couldn’t offer her a comprehensive guide to the oldest and most forgotten branch of magic, but her ancestors had it lying around their home. Of course they did.  
  
Ancestors. She tried not to think about that. She did not readily accept that she was now part of an old wizarding family. It was rather a sudden revelation. No one knew how to deal with it, most of all Morgan. But now she had co-inherited Number 12 Grimmauld Place and this proved to be a wonderful distraction. She had to hurry before Harry came back and told Mrs. Weasly to continue her purging of the place. There were so many fascinating little bottles and dusty parchment rolls. Morgan would die if she allowed them all to be thrown away without a second glance just because they had fallen into the wrong hands. She retrieved the book and stroked it lovingly. “You poor little chunk of knowledge” she cooed quietly, “Labeled as evil simply because no one bothered to understand you”.  
  
The rest of the night she spent at her window, reading frantically. By morning, cigarette buds covered the floor around her, her head was feeling light and her eyes were red and swollen, but her mind was buzzing. Her hand was aching to pick up her wand and start creating. But first coffee.  
  
She snuck downstairs into the kitchen and made herself a two liter jug of that fabulous, hair-curling, teeth-crumpling caffeine.  The rest of the day she spent in her room, curtains drawn, door locked. Anyone who tried to disturb with food or conversation did not get a kind reply.  
  
* * *  
  
The next day, Morgan skipped down the stairs of Number 12 Grimmauld Place and flew into the kitchen, almost knocking a red-haired women in a flowered apron off her feet. “I’m so sorry Mrs. Weasly, I was just looking for…George!” she spotted the twin and forgot Mrs. Weasly completely, “I got it, you have to check this out! Fred!” She slapped a much scribbled upon parchment fragment on the sturdy wooden table in front of him. “You better be ready to have your mind blown.”  
  
Fred, chewing a muffin, strode over to where George was sitting. Morgan made some room and all three bent over her notes. She brushed a stand of wavy pink hair from her eyes, smiled wickedly and pointed to a diagram, “I’m sure you boys recall the many sleepless nights we had over this little pet project last year?”  
  
Fred frowned and stared at Morgan’s smug face, the half-eaten muffin halfway to his mouth. George leaned down over the parchment until his nose was almost touching it, “The Address Book? The thing is a nightmare,” he leaned back in his chair, “Morgan, honey. I know summers are boring, but you got through half of it already, Hogwarts will start before you know it. Don’t do this to us, please.”  
  
Morgan straightened out and put her hands on her hips, “You of all people know the creative properties of boredom. But hey, if you two are so wonderfully skilled at giving up, then I won’t tell you how I managed the binding…” She had their attention. She turned to go but then looked back dramatically. “All the bindings. Simultaneously. Piece of cake, really…”  
  
Before she knew it they were all over her scribbles, almost drooling with anticipation, “I don’t get it, are these runes? Why do you need runes for a visual projection?”  
  
“It’s a sort of binding between similar types of material, the process is called Sympathy,” Morgan leaned in closer, all the while keeping her eyes on the rather too still Mrs. Weasly, and whispered the rest: “I found a book upstairs…” This revelation was not received kindly. Morgan rolled her eyes. “I know, I know, evil stuff, the Blacks could not possibly have any good literature….blah blah, you wanna know or not?” The twins rearranged their faces. She sat down between them and continued, “…That’s how we can have each page dedicated to a different person. They work at the same time. You just open the page and there they are. I even built in a vibrating function so they know you opened their page and wanna talk. It’s like a Muggle cellphone, also has a chat function…Uh, that’s when you leave a written message…”  
  
Tonks and Remus Lupin had just walked in and where talking with Mrs. Weasly as they shuffled into seats at the other end of the table.  
  
“…yeah, exactly, the image gets projected with the help of this binding, I solidified it with runes and as long as they don’t get erased it should hold. And then there is also some Distortion involved, also a courtesy of the Black library. That is what allows the image to be available in real time, you see what is happening wherever the book is.”  
  
Snape walked into the kitchen and passed Tonks and Remus a rolled-up parchment. Then he sat down across from them and accepted the coffee Mrs. Weasly wordlessly placed in front of him.  
  
“…and I made two for now, but I can’t test it on my own,” Morgan took out two leather bound books, tiny enough to fit into her palm. She handed one to George, who flipped it open on the first page and found himself staring into Morgan’s face. “Holy shit, it works!” He exclaimed loud enough for the other side of the table to quiet down and turn towards the three eager teenagers, “I’ve never heard of any one actually using Distortion like this before... I always thought it was just a thought experiment for historians of magic. We have to make more of these, this is amazing! Of course we have to test all the other details first…distance, sound, signal protection…but still… ”  
  
“Distortion?” Tonks broke in with a surprisingly high voice. She was glancing from Fred to George to Morgan with a searching look. Snape lifted his hand slowly to his chin and looked at Morgan attentively, narrowing his eyes. She found herself taking a step back, holdin her Address Book protectively behind her back. Mrs. Weasly was on their side of the table in seconds. She grabbed the second book from George and peered into it anxiously, “This cannot be, how can you children know such things?” Morgan looked down into her own book and saw Mrs. Weasly’s outraged face looking back. Fred and George were suddenly very quiet.  
  
“It’s, uh, not that difficult, most of what we learn in Charms and Transfiguration is a form of Distortion magic,” Morgan began carefully, looking over at Remus and Tonks for support.  
  
“No! Oh dear…No, Morgan it isn’t! Distortion is terrible, dangerous magic, don’t you ever mess around with such things! How did you find out about this, tell me!” She stepped closer to the now rather bewildered Morgan, clutching the book to her chest, “Tell me who it was! Was it someone at Hogwarts?”  
  
Morgan felt a warmth bubbling to the surface somewhere from her gut. Mrs. Weasly was looking at her with the protective and horrified eyes of a parent whose five year old daughter had brought home a severed dog paw because she thought it was pretty. Morgan took a step forward and put her hands on her hips, “Mrs. Weasly, I do not see any reason for such hysteria. Distortion is completely legitimate magic. I have been reading up on it all summer and I would like to ask you to please not insult my intelligence by assuming I would just wave my wand around like an ignorant fool!" There was some uncomfortable shuffling gehind Mrs.Weasly, but Morgan was on a roll and did not break eye contact with the woman she was convinced was trying to limit her freedom. Morgan re-adjusted her wight from the left leg to the right, puffed up her chest and continued, "Distortion is an ancient form of magic that is being used to this day in the most banal and everyday situations. I believe, in fact, that the last time you ran the bath upstairs you could not have possibly had the water emerge without the help of Distortion unless, of course, the Blacks have Muggle pipelines installed in their ancestral home?”  
  
Fred mumbled her name and attempted to put his hand on Morgan’s arm but she jerked away from him. This was the last drop. All summer she put up with the suspicious looks and uncomfortable silences every time she entered a room and she had had enough.  
  
“What I did here, Mrs. Weasly, is not another semi-permanent eye shadow color. It is also not a weapon or a poison. It is a tool that will greatly facilitate communication. It was inspired by Muggle technology as well as by enchanted mirrors. Considering the _times_ we live in and _task_ at hand, I am sure you can picture how useful this could be. I am trying to _help_.”  
  
Mrs. Weasly stood with her mouth open but did not say a word, her expression going from outrage to pity. Snape calmly took a sip of his coffee. Tonks reached out her hand and gave Morgan a weak smile, “Let me have a look at your notes, maybe I could spot something.”  Eager for input and discussion, Morgan hurried over to the other side of the table to Tonks, forgetting the tension in the room and her anger at being prematurely judged. The two friends mumbled quietly to each other, with Morgan pointing and explaining energetically, while Tonks nodded occasionally and asked a few pointed questions. “It seems to make sense,” She said after a while, “Although these runes are quite unusual. If you have any questions come to me, I would like to see the final result, this thing could be quite handy. What did you say you guys called it?”  
  
“Address Book,” Morgan answered, folding up the paper and putting it away. Then she went over to Mrs. Weasly and took the second book out of her hand, “See? Tonks says it’s fine. And she said she is willing to help me complete it…”  
  
“ _Toooonks_!” Mrs. Weasly hissed in disapproval. Remus looked uncomfortable but Snape cleared his throat, “I have tricked myself into hoping that this would be a serious and **short** meeting”.  
  
Morgan was about to leave the room, followed by Fred and George, who were chuckling slightly at the drama, but Mrs. Weasly stopped them. “Morgan,” She began cautiously, “It’s not that I don’t think you can do some great magic, we all know you can…it’s just that,” she sighed, “It’s just that I am afraid, _we_ are afraid that you may not be very careful sometimes. Lately, you have been acting different. You are in distress and I understand, but, I worry, Morgan. You are still slightly unbalanced and may not always have the best judgment after…” She trailed off and resorted to simply staring at Morgan with a mixture of pity and concern.  All eyes were on Morgan and no one knew what to say. All her fire was gone now, so was her smugness and her excitement. Now there was just a familiar howling emptiness. She thought of all the snappy responses she could put out there to make them all feel bad for their moment of hesitation. But nothing seemed good enough.  She just looked back into Mrs. Weasley’s eyes, then at Remus, then at Tonks, then to Snape seemed bored, except for a barel noticable twitching on the sides of his mouth, as if he was trying to contain a smile. Fred and George were looking pointedly at the floor. She wanted to explain that she was not insane, not any more than the rest of them. That she just wanted to help, to _do_ something. But these people were projecting all of their accumulated bitterness and worry onto her, the poor little girl who lost a father she never knew she had. She wanted to tell them that she didn’t care. It didn’t matter that he had been related to her. She had simply lost a friend, just like the rest of them. Her loss was not greater than theirs. He had never told her who he was. It didn’t fucking matter. She didn’t want to be the mourning orphan, she wanted to be a warrior scarred by a world that took her friend, aching for revenge. Instead, she just turned and left the kitchen quietly. Fred and George didn’t follow.


	3. Chapter 2 Bad Girl

The next morning Morgan found Tonks sitting alone at the kitchen table, scribbling something on the end of a long parchment role in deep concentration. Morgan suspected that the young Auror had probably stayed the night, based on how the meeting had stretched into the early hours of the morning, as they often did. When Morgan made the decision to move into the dreary Grimmauld Place mansion, she never suspected that groups of Aurors would be whispering and shuffling papers behind closed doors quite as frequently as had been the case all summer. To Morgan, of course, the doors remained stubbornly locked and the conversations muffled. Very soon, the Aurors passed from being welcome company to a regular annoyance, with only a few rare exceptions.  
  
  
“Hey Tonks!” she grinned, “I was hoping to see you soon, I need you to model a new hair-color for me…” Morgan skipped over to her and sat down across the table. Tonks smiled and sighed with dramatically exasperation. A second later Morgan found herself staring at her own face.  
“Ok, so it’s a light green…with some dark streaks and it’s about boob length…” Tonks obediently turned her hair into something that looked like silky seaweed.  
“Perfect!” Morgan ignored her friend’s twisted face expression, “Make it have a soft wave, and thicker. Now make the skin paler. And the eyes should be a light, _light_ grey. Deep shadow on the lids. Yes.” She produced a mirror from her pocket and put it in front of Tonks' transformed face.  
  
  
“Wow. Fierce.” The doubt had evaporated and was replaced with awe. Morgan agreed. It looked intense. Otherwordly. Angry. Just what she needed.  
  
  
“Forgive me if I don’t stay to chat but I have some very complicated hair dye to mix!” and Morgan resigned herself to the large bathroom upstairs for the next three hours.  
  
As she stripped while waiting for water to fill the immense, golden bathtub, Morgan realized with a sinking feeling that she had not thanked Tonks for her help. She had come across such nagging feelings of regret for the most unspectacular social blunders rather frequently in the recent months, and knew how to remove them. But the girl could not help but wonder about the reasons for such a sudden fear of hurting people. Sometimes, Morgan would be overtaken with such a strong wave of doubt and guilt that she would be left paralized and unable to leave her room. At first, she would deal with it by crawling under the covers and trying to breath regularly, gain some perspective. With every new attack it became easier, and now all she had to do was not think about it. That simple. Feeling sorry never helped anyone, she was sure.  
  
Morgan shrugged and patted the golden gargoyle towel-holder. She had named him Ladybug because he looked like a macho-bastard of a creature and she hated having him stare at her every time she got naked. Then she opened her sleek, multi-dimensional make-up kit and got to work.  
  
When Morgan came downstairs she found the population of Grimmauld Place had changed. Her favorite two Weasleys were lounging carelessly in the drawing room, pretending to throw fireballs at the carpet on the wall that depicted the Black family tree.  
  
  
She cleared her throat. Once she had their attention she twirled around dramatically and beamed at the twins.  
  
They stared.  
  
“You look like a mermaid or something…” Fred commented finally.  
  
George was ineffectively hiding a grin behind his hand. They were used to her changing her hair color every week the entire summer, but this was the most drastic it had ever gotten.  
  
“Green…” George attempted, “How, uh, nature friendly…”  
  
She let them mock her. She loved it and no one could change her mind. Feeling on top of the world, she swung herself into an empty armchair. “So what brings you to my mansion on this fine day?”  
  
Fred looked up at the ceiling, “Well nothing special really. Oh, wait. Actually there was something: We have been setting up your sector in the store!"  
  
“What! It’s been approved? Shit, we have to go there <i>now</i>!” She was up on her feet in an instant.  
  
“Hey, hey crazy girl, relax. They are still adding some finishing touches on the extension and painting the walls, it should be done by tomorrow. We were thinking…” he glanced over to George, “You could come stay at place and then start terrorizing the workers tomorrow morning.”  
  
Morgan considered this. Being away from the concerned eyes of Mrs. Weasly, not having to be reminded of Sirius Black by every piece of dust in this corpse of a building… “Sure. Lets get out of here.”  
  
* * *  
  
“Yeah but I mean, he didn’t tell you. That must really suck…” George concluded as he poured Morgan more wine.  
  
“I know.” She was leaning back on the couch, her legs propped on the coffee table, surveying their studio apartment. The setting sun and randomly placed candles illuminated what could, at first glance, appear to be the wreckage left by a hurricane. The floor was covered in clothing and random gadgets, while the winding stairs to the sleeping quarters were stacked with parchment and dirty pates. It was a wonderful, free mess. Morgan sighed. “It was cowardly. But I guess he knew that it was too late to be a father...So he decided to be the cool uncle instead. That way he wouldn’t have to boss me around. Instead, he got to sneak out for a smoke with me or share a whiskey flask under the table.” She felt something inside her turn uncomfortably. The memory of Sirius’s glowing face popped up in her mind as they both half-hung out of her window in Grimmauld Place, sharing a cigarette and loving the feeling of being up to no good.  
  
“I don’t think it was because he didn’t want to take responsibility, Morgan. I think he was afraid you would not accept him.” George continued, taking a sip.  
  
“Yep. That's what his letter said. Don't you think it’s weird that he actually wrote a letter to me in case he should die. Was he so prepared for death that he thought of wrapping up loose ends like that? Is anyone ever that prepared?”  
  
All three of them contemplated this question for a few moments, their drunk minds fighting the discomfort of concrete morbid memories and settling on abstract concepts instead.  
  
“And why would he even think I needed to know? I really didn’t…” Morgan trailed off.  
  
Fred stood up and took out a little plastic baggie, a mirror and a wallet out of a drawer in the kitchen. “He was just a man, Morgan, he couldn’t help himself. He was probably really proud that you were his flesh and blood…”  
  
Morgan smiled at how he managed to turn this conversation into a compliment. The wine, the apartment, the relaxed conversation: she knew what they were doing, and they were doing it well.  
  
Fred sat down next to her, “Besides, I have something here that should take your mind off things…” He put down the mirror and began pouring out a flakey white powder. Then he separated it with a ruler into three lines.  
  
“What’s this?” Morgan asked suspiciously. She snatched the baggie from his hand and sniffed. “Cocaine? Are you kidding me? Molly would be devastated!”  
  
Fred and George were staring at her in surprise. “You can recognize Cocaine by the smell? That’s messed-up…”  
  
“My spoiled slut of an older sister tried to get me to take some when I was 13. Supposedly, it’s what all the cool kids did at her boarding school…” Morgan cocked her head to the side mockingly and then made a face, “Whatever.”  
  
“And you took some?” Fred asked, appalled.  
  
“No, no. It's always been just cigarettes and alcohol for me!” Morgan raised her glass in a salute to no one in particular, “So, uh, what the hell: hard drugs? You guys…” She shook her head in exaggerated disapproval.  
  
“Well, we got this stuff from Bill. It’s Muggle grown but wizard processed. Supposed to be cleaner and safer,” Fred explained as he rolled a Pound note into a little tube.  
  
“Bill?” Morgan couldn’t believe her ears, “Bill supplies his little brothers with Coke? That is brilliant, I’m starting to love this family more and more. What’s Fleur’s take on the matter?”  
  
“Fleur?” Fred laughed, “She likes to party just as much as the next girl!”  
  
Morgan eyed the innocent thin line of powder. Her heart beat a little faster, but she ignored it. “Ah what the hell! Apparently I’m a bad, bad girl now with clouded judgment. Better not disappoint.”  
  
She held the little tube in her hand awkwardly but could not help smiling. Snorting Cocaine through money, how decadent.  Morgan hated being insecure, so without any further ado, she held her breath, leaned down over the mirror and snorted. She made sure to keep her head down as she straightened out, so that they couldn’t see her face in this moment of weakness.  
  
It stung at first but then she felt an intense rush. Her head was clear, her world easy and exciting. Her heart was pumping away at maximum capacity. She could do anything.  
  
To honor the Muggle drugs, they put on _The Cure_ , the twin’s favorite Muggle band. Morgan laughed and twirled around the room as Robert Smith moaned in the background. She stepped lightly over the piles of clothing parchment roles and dishes. Fred offered her his hand and pulled her into a wild walz. He held her close to him, his hand strong and dominant on the small of her back. A further twirl unbalanced Morgan and forced her to fly right into him, her back arched, and her breasts and belly pressed onto his chest. This was when a wave of shudders passing along her body brought her a new awareness of the situation. Her insides contracted and her breathing became faster as she contemplated just how close they were and how hard and muscular his body felt pressed against hers. Morgan had never seen her childhood friend as a man and the presence of such novelty in something so familiar disturbed her. She pulled away with a sassy smile and took a few steps back while maintaining eye contact.  
  
She lifted her arms to her hair and stumbled a little. “You guys, let’s go to a Muggle club! Come on, it will be fun!”  
  
Morgan could not remember if they agreed to her brilliant plan, but soon all three were running along the London streets. They found a park and had a smoke after they took turns burning their initials into the wood of a chosen bench. Sitting in the shadow right outside the circle of light from a lantern, Morgan felt everything slowing down. The world looked dirtier, she felt uglier. Her seaweed hair fell into her frame of vision and she ran her fingers through it dully. It was ridiculous, she looked like a salad.  
  
“Take me home,” she ordered. Fred and George protested, asked what was wrong, touched her arm.  
  
“Just take me home, dammit!”  
  
Moments later she was sitting on the floor under their stairs, leaning against a wall while holding a forgotten cigarette and staring into the distance. Fred and George also began to come down from their high. They opened another bottle of wine and the three sat there in silence.


	4. Chapter 3 Chiuma

“Where is Harry! Have you seen Harry?” Mrs. Weasly ran up the stars to Mrogan’s subsection in the store and dragged her away from a make-over session with a particularly chubby Huffelpuff fifth year. 

“Uh, he was in the back with Fred and George just a few minutes ago, Mrs. Weasley…” Morgan offered, pointing her brush over Mrs.Weasley’s shoulder, “I think Ron and Hermione were with him?”

Mrs.Weasly released Morgan and was off without another word. Morgan put down the brush and went down the stairs to Ginny, who was cooing at the box of Pygmy Puffs. 

“They’re pretty cute, eh?” Morgan picked up a blue one and put in on Ginny’s head, where the furry little ball proceeded to roll around and purr, “We were thinking of making some of them have fangs so they could suck the colors from curtains and carpets and stuff. They are just too cute to not cause trouble.” Morgan grinned as Ginny carefully removed the creature from her hair with an apprehensive look. 

“Don’t worry, we haven’t managed yet. And even if we do, the twins would never allow their creations to harm the perfection that is naturally red hair…So, uh, what is up with your mum?”

Ginny made a face, “She gets really panicky lately if any one of us is not within her eye’s view for more than two minutes…”

“Difficult times call for insane measures, I guess,” Morgan rolled her eyes, “So how’s the Burrow, Fleur still terrorizing the place?”

“Oh don’t even mention the Phlegm to me, pleeeease” Ginny made as to cover her ears, “She is insufferable! I don’t know how you ever could stand her! Are you sure you want to live in…you know, the _place_ , all summer? You could come stay with us, save us from the Veelah-banshee infestation…”

“Nah, I don’t like to impose my company, Mrs.Weasly has so much going on this summer. I have my own house now, so I should live there. Besides, it’s not so bad, I’m mostly at Fred and George’s.” Morgan pointed at the ceiling.

Ginny turned to the bustling group of girls in Morgan’s make-up section, “You are a sensation, you know. All of my friends are crazy about the products, even several guys, although they would die if anyone -”

A shrill sound from the entrance of the store indicated that Mrs. Weasly had found the runaway teenagers.

“…Gotta go.” Ginny mumbled apologetically, grabbing the blue Pygmy Puff before disappearing into the crowd. 

Morgan watched her friends leave the store. She imagined how they would be doing chores at the Burrow, making faces at Fleur behind her back and playing Quiddich in the back yard. Since her first year, she had stayed with the Weasleys every summer. Fred and George had introduced her as their first-year progeny and the three would spend days in their room trying to make gum that grows in size and foams alarmingly at every chew or finding new places to conceal cheats for exams. During the summers, she had met Ginny, Harry, Ron and Hermione, although they rarely spent time together at school. Being part of a close knit collection of such different people had been like having a family. But now everything was different and she simply could not continue her life as it had been before. Morgan was now a Black. The dark and dusty Grimmauld Place was now her home and its corridors and rooms had integrated themselves into the network of corridors and rooms of her life. She _was_ Grimmauld Place, a mysterious nucleus of power about to change hands. Morgan leaned against a shelf and tried to shake these dramatic thoughts. She wondered if this was what someone narrating her story would call “the loss of innocence”? She decided they wouldn’t, since surely her loss of innocence occurred last summer on a Muggle beach resort by moon light…

* * *

That night, Fleur and Bill came unannounced to Fred and George’s new place. Fleur barged in through the door with a bottle of Elf Champaign and hugged the surprised twins before they knew what was happening. Bill was standing sheepishly in the doorway, surveying the messy apartment.

The Veelah stretched out her hands towards Morgan and pulled her into a gracious hug, kissing her on both cheeks. “You beautiful girl, so wonderful to see you again!” she purred in her think French accent. Morgan tried to remove glistening blond hairs from her mouth and pulled away, smiling despite herself. 

Apparently, Fleur had wanted some “adult time” and insisted on crashing the twins’ place. Soon they discovered that she wasn’t kidding, since apart from the champagne, she had also stored five bottles of wine in Bills backpack and a mysterious metal box with a lion engraved on it.

After the first bottle had vanished and everyone was looking slightly redder and laughing slightly louder, Bill took the box from an impatient Fleur and explained: “This is Chiuma. Its produced in Russia from a herb called Koshei that grows exclusively around monasteries in Siberia.” He grinned and dumped several blue chunks onto the table from the metal box, “Courtesy of Charlie, by the way. The stuff is very popular among Dragon rearers, since it boosts energy and increases control over one’s body, making you stronger and faster. For a wizard, it also channels magic more effectively. But the best part is the intense high.”

Bill momentarily grew quiet as he crushed the blue chunks into a powder and took out a more familiar ingredient, which he then mixed into the pile.

“Goes great with cocaine. We…” he glanced over to Fleur, who was looking at the table hungrily, “Have been quite enjoying this new discovery, if you know what I mean.” He winked conspirationally to the twins and they rewarded him with a laugh. Morgan smiled and rolled her eyes. Guys will be guys. 

Fleur was shining with excitement and ignored the comment. She swung herself onto the couch next to Bill and took a Pound note out of the box. In what was already a familiar motion for Morgan, she rolled it up and separated a line out of the pile. She leaned down and snorted. Fred, George and Morgan watched as she resurfaced, a content smile drawn across her face. She leaned back on the couch and looked at them with a strange focus in her eyes. 

Morgan took the Pound note and leaned over the table. Once she felt the familiar stinging in her nose, she realized just how different this stuff was from anything she had ever known. She felt the magic running through her veins, but the excitement did not cloud her mind or make the world seem more complex and fast. Everything was completely under her control. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she registered an acute awareness of the proportions of things, of the pressure exercised on them, the relationships between them. This would be perfect in a duel, she thought, knowing how much force is necessary to do precisely what you need, to hit the exact target…

She walked over to the window and stared outside, calculating how strong her _lumos_ would need to be in order for the light to remain invisible in topmost window of the opposite building. A few minutes ago she didn’t even know that she could make the light spell vary in intensity.

Fleur came up to Morgan. “The boys are discussing that boring Quiddich,” she informed her, “Do you want to see what we did at Beauxbatons when boys weren’t around?”

“Uh…”

“Come.” Fleur flung open the window and took Morgan’s hand. They climbed out by the fire escape and onto the tiled roof. Fleur skipped elegantly to the ridge and spread her arms. Then she flicked her wand and floated upwards. Remaining about half a meter from the tip of the roof, she stepped forwards as if the air was a dance floor, twirling and winding to a tune in her head.

Stuck with her feet firmly on the roof and feeling suddenly very heavy and chunky, Morgan called out to the shimmering figure above her: “How did y-“

“Levitate! Levitate!” the Veelah called back to her, waving her arm impatiently.

Of course! Morgan though. Self-levitation, so simple and yet so often overlooked. She scrambled to the top of the roof, her arms spread out for balance and then flicked the wand towards her feet. The amount of control it required to keep herself right-side up while in the air would have likely overwhelmed her if she had been sober, but now it was a simple task, like balancing an empty tray on your hand. 

And up she soared, over the dark and slippery roofs of Diagon Alley. They came to a set of Muggle power lines and Morgan lowered herself so low that it looked like she was actually standing on the wire, while actually her feet were separated from it by a millimeter of air. She then pretended to walk on it like they would do in a Muggle circus. Fleur laughed and imitated her, the only difference being that she walked along the wire while being upside-down. Morgan then feigned losing balance and plunged downwards only to shoot up again before reaching the ground. Fleur’s worried face turned into a broad smile when she saw that Morgan was not a pile of goop on a Muggle street. As revenge for the shock, the Veelah took off back towards Diagon Alley and out of sight. Morgan found her lounging on the roof of Gringotts. Morgan joined her and swung her legs over the edge. 

“I really love roofs,” she told Fleur, “So you Beauxbatons girls flew around France at night, like stereotypical witches? Don’t tell me you also danced naked in the woods!”

Fleur laughed, outraged, “No! Naked in the woods is so unhygienic! Who comes up with something like that? We are Veelah! Not some dirty witches!” She turned to Morgan, “You know, you are very beautiful, do you magically alter your face?” She stretched out her hand and ran it over Morgan’s cheek.

“Well not really, I just change my hair color, put on some make-up…but I don’t like to change the actual features.”

Fleur ran her finger along Morgan’s cheek-bone, “You could be a part Veelah like me, if your eyes were bigger and you nose a bit thinner…” She was examining her with the eyes of a merchant picking out a horse at a market, making Morgan feel much more like an object than like a girl. Morgan wondered if this was how Fleur was used to being looked at by men all the time and hence saw nothing wrong about it.

“No,” Morgan laughed and pulled away, resting her eyes on the horizon of pointy rooftops, “I’m no Veelah. My dad was, uh, Sirius, as you know. So he was pure-blood. And my mom was also a witch, but I never knew her, so maybe she was Muggle-born. She was working for a rich Muggle family, and they adopted me after she committed suicide…” Morgan trailed off and heard Fleur make a disgusted sound.

“Working for Muggles? Tsah! Then you must have all your magic from the Blacks!”

Morgan felt herself tense up, “After all you have seen, how can you say that pure-bloods are superior magicians! Hermione is-“

“Best of her year, yes. But that is because she is disciplined and focused. The Muggle magic is a rational magic, while the wizard magic is about emotion and intuition. Pure-blood magic is not necessarily better, but it is different,” Fleur got up and stretched, her lean body twisting like a cats while her blond hair swirled and caught the moonlight. “Everyone knows that, “she concluded.

Morgan opened her mouth in protest, but Fleur cut her off, “And if you have some other magical blood, like Veelah or elf, then it is even more different from the Muggle magic. Wizards don’t like to talk of it, but it is a fact! Why deny it?” And she flew off, leaving Morgan fuming and flabbergasted at the shameless contradictions in her speech. 

* * *

The next evening Morgan took a taxi to Grimmauld Place, once again reminded about how she was still a little witch baby that could not apparate. Thankfully, throughout the previous weeks, Fred or George had helped her sneak over to Grimauld Place at night in order to save some more books and potion ingredients before the inevitable cleansing. Nevertheles, she had gotten so tired of rolling around in the dust and cobwebs that she instructed Kreacher to save whatever he thought was worthy. The house elf was so thankful that he even stopped calling her names and spitting on her shoes, a small step, but an improvement in their relationship nonetheless. 

The mansion seemed empty and Morgan relaxed. She dumped her jacket on the kitchen table and called out “Kreacher!” at the top of her lungs.

With a pop, the filthy, wrinkled elf appeared right in front of her and she almost stepped on him.

“No need for mistress to yell so loud, Kreacher is not deaf,” he pointed out grudgingly. 

“Oh, uh, sorry Kreacher,” she stepped back and ran her hand through her hair. These encounters were never pleasant and ordering around someone older and angrier than her was not something Morgan did naturally, “Have you been hiding away all valuables from the house like I told you?”

“Of course, mistress. Kreacher would not let the heritage of the noble house of Black fall in the hands of filthy Mudbloods.”

“Of course. Uhm, ok well I need to borrow some things…”

“What would mistress desire?” he asked graciously, although Morgan detected a scraping of teeth.

“Well, I need that _Ancient Potions_ book, and a couple of Troll teeth and …can I maybe just look through the stash?”

After she rephrased her request into a direct order, Kreacher led her upstairs into the attic, where a mountain of goblets, books and bottles covered the floor, hidden under a ragged old blanket. Not wishing to touch anything, she summoned all she needed and left the grumpy elf to clean up the mess, since she was sure he preferred the extra work to her persisting presence in his hideout. 

She then fled to her room, which Morgan had had all summer to decorate and perceived as truly her own. Considering how many anti-intruder charms she had put on it, it could hardly be anybody else’s even if there were contestants. Unlike everything else in the mansion, her room was bright (thanks to a fake window which had taken an entire hour to charm into existence) and had new curtains, countless posters, a large bed and an embroidered blanket. As much as she enjoyed Fred and George’s company, Morgan cherished her alone-time.

The rest of the night she spent working out a vague plan for an anti- _Crucio_ bracelet and then by morning she attempted to fix a glitch Fred had discovered in the Address Book. Apparently, everything worked fantastically with two books, but as soon as they created a third, back lags of almost three minutes became the norm and sometimes George’s page would show an entirely different location all together, for example some Muggles having dinner in their home or a two teenagers in France flying over a field on second-hand broomsticks. Although the three thought this was a fascinating discovery and vowed to create a Spy Book at the next opportunity, a three-way Address Book system had so far refused to work as intended.

At seven a.m., with three heavy volumes opened on the floor around her, parchment roles scattered on the bed and a steaming cauldron on her lap, Morgan decided to stop everything and get some coffee. She took the Distortion book and her copy of the Address Book and channeled the rest of her energy into stumbling downstairs while trying to keep her eyes from closing. Once she was on the first floor and about to round the corner towards the kitchen, she found herself staring at the face of Severus Snape, who was contemplating her disheveled look with some distaste.

“Please don’t tell me you are planning to flaunt your Dark Arts abilities in front of a group of Aurors… again,” he said with an exasperated sigh. 

“I-“

“Also. You should hardly be needing a wand if you are underage and outside of Hogwarts, am I correct?” He eyed the wand sticking out from her hair, which she had developed the habit of keeping tucked behind her ear. 

“What? Oh, this thing? I don’t use it, Sn-sir, I just carry it round for safety. These are difficult times we live in, very difficult times…” She nodded enthusiastically, causing the incriminating wand to topple out from behind her ear and clatter onto the floor.

Snape stared at her now scarlet face dispassionately and then slowly drew out his own wand. He levitated hers and held it between his forefinger and thumb with a knowing look, as if challenging her to maintain some dignity in this increasingly unequal situation. Morgan, seeing no other options before her, re-adjusted the book in her arms and reached out for the wand, her arm at an awkward angle. She did not like him holding it, nor did she like the emerging hint of a smirk on his face. To her surprise, Snape let her simply take her wand back and walked past without any further ado.

Suddenly, he stopped and turned back, his low voice rumbling down the hallway to where Morgan had remained standing. “Molly Weasly is in the kitchen, I suppose you might find that bit of information useful. Please, do your very best not to dilute a serious meeting with teenage melodrama for once.”

As much as she hated to admit it, it was useful information. Useful enough for her to turn on the spot and head right back upstairs. 


	5. Chapter 5 Hogwarts

The last few days before the Hogwarts express Morgan spent immersed in very concentrated effort to fix the Address Book. Distortion, as Morgan had explained to Fred and George, could be used to alter the nature of reality and say, make a location that was somewhere else completely become connected to a place that was on another continent. The problem was making it stay there. After two sleepless nights and grumpy mornings, it turned out that a different set of runes did the trick. They agreed, for safety, to never use all three Address Books simultaneously and were thus ready to send Morgan off to Hogwarts, the question of communication solved.

On the day of the Hogwarts express, Morgan had to be dragged out of bed and apparated to Kings-Cross Station by a very sleepy Fred, who shoved her and her trunk onto the train in the last minute, mumbling some motivational words about wreaking havoc and destruction. Her hair was a mess, her make-up, being her own invention, was fine, but her eyes were bloodshot and her mood not the brightest. She started looking for Fred and George, but then realized that they had quit school the year before. In fact, her sluggish mind reminded her, she had just said good-bye to one of them at the station.

Morgan swore. Who was going to be her friend now? She moved through the wagons, glancing into the compartments and trying to remember whom she liked and whom she didn’t. Slowly, she woke up through the familiar giggling and chattering, wooshing of spells, sliding of doors and clanking of the train. Morgan found herself smiling. She was on her way to Hogwarts, the busy, mystical and exciting castle that had been her home for five years. 

In a badly timed attempt to avoid a stampede of second-year girls, Morgan got slammed against a compartment door. Through the corner of her eye, she saw Harry, Neville and Luna sitting inside. Glad for a chance to get herself and her trunk away from the narrow and hostile corridor, she slid the door open and greeted the three with a hestitant smile. She had spent time with Harry Potter on several occasions during the summers at the Burrow, and of course she had had time to get to know all three of them during the DA meetings last year, never mind fighting alongside each other at the Ministry… But somehow she still felt like she was walking in on something. Since there was no turning back now, Morgan pumped some more life into her smile and dumped her trunk confidently on the floor. 

Harry greeted her politely and moved his stuff from the space next to him. Neville and Luna seemed more enthusiastic, and bombarded her with inquiries about the Weasley’s Wizard Weezes. Harry remained silent.  While Luna and Neville became engrossed in a discussion about Crumple-Horned Snorckaks, Morgan nudged Harry, who was staring out of the window. “So it seems we now own a house together,” she whispered, flashing him a most suggestive smile. Harry seemed slightly flustered, but his look turned hard and he turned away again. “I don’t want it,” he mumbled.  

Morgan raised an eye-brow. This would be more difficult than expected. She felt that there was some sort of distance between her and Harry, almost an animosity that she could not place. And the more she thought about it, the less she was sure that it was only from his side. 

After it had already become dark, Ron and Hermione entered the compartment. Ron greeted Morgan with grunts and muffled exclamations, since he was trying to speak though a full mouth. He plopped down across from her and offered around a handful of half-melted Chocolate Frogs. Morgan thankfully took one, since she was starving by that point and had not been too keen on trying Luna’s ani-Buzmy-Nork sandwiches, whatever the hell that was. The Frog Morgan had picked came with a Morgana le Fay card, one that Morgan had never gotten before. She examined the picture idly, which portrayed a dashing witch with long dark curls and different colored eyes, one light green and the other violet. She squinted at the brief informative text under it.

“… _In addition to her knowledge of the Dark Arts, she was exceptionally talented as a Healer, and was an Animagus who could turn into a bird,_ ” Morgan read out to no one in particular, “… That’s strange, I didn’t know the Dark Arts could be used for Healing, did y-”

Before Morgan could finish, their door slid open and a shy second-year handed Ron, who was closest, three stamped parchment rolls. She seemed glad to be rid of the task and slipped away immediately, stealing one last wide-eyed glance at Harry. 

“Harry Potter, Neville Longbottom and … Morgan Vence,” he handed out rolls and inquired, “What did you guys do?”

Morgan unrolled hers and discovered it was an invitation from a Horace Slughorn to join him in his compartment. 

“Who the hell is Horace Slughorn?” she asked.

Neville looked just as confused, but Harry informed them frostily that Horace Slughorn was a new teacher at Hogwarts whom Dumbledore had introduced him to during the summer.

“He collects people,” Harry concluded his explanation simply.

Having no other options, the three took off reluctantly through the train. Once they arrived at the appointed compartment, they could see through the glass that they about to walk in on what was already quite a cozy gathering. Having slid open the door, the three were received energetically by an incredibly round, bouncy man with a large moustache, who proved to be the mysterious Professor Slughorn. He squeezed the three newcomers into their seats and sat down himself, a satisfied smile playing on his glistening face. Talking mostly to Harry, he began making introductions. Morgan spotted Ginny and smiled at her. The rest of the group consisted of Cormac McLaggen, Marcus Belby, Blaise Zabini and Saul Graf. The last two Morgan recalled as friends of Draco Malfoy’s, or at least fellow Slytherins, since both seemed too convinced of their own self-worth to allow Malfoy as much as a sneeze in their direction without calling for retribution. 

Morgan quickly discovered that Slughorn had invited students whom he believed to be particularly talented or well-connected, and he seemed to have done this on a rather short notice. Ginny, as Slughorn was quick to explain once he saw that Harry knew her, had caught his attention by performing a marvelous Bat-Bogey Hex in the hall. McLaggen and Zabini had famous relatives, Harry, was, well, the Chosen One and-

“For those of you here who may not know, this is Morgan Vence, co-owner of the successful Weasley Wizard Weezes store, am I right, my dear?”

“Uh, well technically I have to be 17 to o-“

“No matter about formalities, what matters here is that you are the brain behind many of the beautiful bits of magic on sale there! I must say, it is a remarkably successful enterprise! Jokes and toys in these difficult times, what brilliant economic thinking!” He folded his hands on his belly and shifted in his seat contently.

Morgan felt her back tense. Before she knew it, she had opened her mouth: “I resent the implication that we opened the store in order to take advantage of a frightened population!”

Slughorn turned his entire body towards her and contemplated Morgan in what seemed to be a new light. 

“The Weasley twins are also quite the strong-headed fellows, I hear. Well, you will learn that I gladly support independent thinking,” he chuckled, “No matter, dear. Here, have some liquorish…I don’t know if you’ve met Saul Graf, the grandson of Sebasian Graf? Who was, of course, a sensational historian that enlightened the wizarding community by going back in time to do actual field work in the times of King Arthur! Always made sure to get the facts straight, didn’t he, Saul?”

Saul Graf smiled politely and shook a dark curl out his cold, deep-set eyes, “I’m afraid I only knew him when he was already in his 80s and quite senile, sir. But he did leave behind some intriguing notes that were never published.”

“Marvelous, marvelous! Your family is truly blessed! So tell me, Saul, you are about to begin your final year at Hogwarts, correct? Do you intend to follow in your grandfather’s footsteps?”

Graf did his polite smile again, “I do intend to go into research, sir. There is much that we still do not know.”

As rehearsed as that sounded, Morgan could not help but be impressed to hear something so agreeable from a Sytherin. But her positive assessment of the pale youth lost all hope of taking off ground once a certain memory from fourth year popped into her mind that involved Graf and Malfoy putting a little Muggle-born girl into the hospital wing for a week with boils allover her body and a shaved head. 

The rest of the meeting consisted of more forced socializing until Slughorn suddenly ushered them out of the compartment, exclaiming that it was terribly late and promising further invitations to all except Neville. 

On the way back to their compartment, Harry disappeared, mumbling about needing to “check something” and left Morgan and Neville alone. Morgan listened to Neville’s assessment of Slughorn as a “douche” and a “slimy troll”, while trying to dull her hunger. She had had nothing but sweets all day and her body was in revolt. 

When the train arrived in Hogsmead, Morgan lost the others at the platform and ended up sharing a carriage with some Ravenclaw girls she had befriended in Arithmacy the year before and could probably consider the very first customers of her cosmetics line. The girls chatted about their summers while Morgan watched the skeletal, winged horses that drew the carriage. They were truly beautiful creatures, she thought, so morbid and yet so vulnerable. Last year, when they flew to the Ministry, Morgan had discovered that most people could not see them since Thestrals only revealed themselves to those who had seen death. Morgan was rather confused about whose death she may have witnessed, until it hit her that her mother had committed suicide and that she had probably seen the body as a child. She had also seen Sirius die, of course. A death that she actually remembered. It didn’t feel like she had witnessed something extraordinary. He had just faded into the arc like he had never existed. While carefully handling this raw memory that was usually kept somewhere in the dark cellar of her mind, Morgan realized that Sirius had, indeed, stopped living long before that night. He had been in hiding for years and all the world knew about him were lies. Sirius had already been a dead man. 

The Thestrals came to a halt and Morgan tore her eyes away from the tangible evidence of the fact that she had seen both of her parents die. 

* * *

The Great Hall was bright and buzzing with voices. Morgan had found a seat with Neville, Ron, Hermione and Ginny. Hermione was quick to interrogate Morgan on whether she had seen Harry. Except briefly experiencing a Mrs. Weasly déjà vu, Morgan could contribute nothing towards resolving the tense situation. 

Dumbledor’s speech passed, and the first-years were sorted, but Harry was still  nowhere to be seen. By this point, Hermoine was a nervous wreck, refusing to eat and glancing at the doors every three seconds. Ron was stuffing his face with pudding and Ginny was quiet, her face unreadable. 

“Will. You. Stop. Eating!” Hermoine smacked Ron on the shoulder with her book, punctuating every word, “Your best friend is missing!”

“No he isn’t, you crazy woman, there he is right there,” Ron grumbled.

Harry was indeed walking over to them, accompanied by Luna. His face was covered in blood. He slumped into the empty seat between Morgan and Ginny, looking serious, although the effect was slightly ruined by the blood smeared all over his chin. Ginny started wiping the blood slowly with her napkin. Morgan raised an eyebrow. “What happened to you?”

“Malfoy,” he stated ominously.

Morgan glanced over to the Slytherin table automatically and spotted the bleach-blond head of Draco Malfoy. He was staring at his half-filled plate, chin propped-up on his hand, playing with a fork absentmindedly. He did not seem to be celebrating his victory over Harry Potter, whatever it had been. 

Since Harry was reluctant to give further details about the reason for his bloody chin, the conversation switched to Dumbledor’s speech, which had been a quite pointed although eloquent collection of musings about the impressionability of youth and the danger this posed to Hogwarts and the world. 

Dumbledore stood up again and announced that Slughorn was to be the new Potions Master, while Snape would take over the position of Defence Against the Dark Arts. The Hall dissolved in bewildered whispers. Everyone knew that Snape had been after the position since he began teaching at Hogwarts, and everyone also knew that he never stood a chance of actually having it while Dumbledor was Headmaster.

Morgan looked towards Snape. His face was dispassionate as always as he sat between Flitwick and McGonagall at the Headmaster’s table, but Morgan imagined the raging triumph that must have been boiling inside of him. Some cheers came from the Slytherin table and Snape lifted an acknowledging hand, but otherwise, he did not even smile. She felt her own muscles tense up with adrenalin as the Great Hall crackled with whispers but she was brought back to reality with a bang. Centimeters from her left ear, Harry had let out an exclamation of disbelief. Her ears ringing, Morgan turned towards him, ready to offer payback, but paused. It was then that she realized she was happy for Snape. He deserved this position and no one should decide for someone else what is a temptation and what is the one thing that makes them happy. She looked at Harry’s face, screwed-up with emotion, as he continued to express his anger to Ron and Hermione, who both seemed concerned and confused. For a moment, Morgan thought she felt hate, but decided to register it as disgust. She never liked Snape, that much was true. He was a creep as well as petty and embarrassingly obvious about his favorites. But wishing him to never get something as silly as his preferred job position was low. Morgan opened her mouth to speak with more resolution, about to cause some serious damage, but was saved by the chaos of shuffling of chairs and calling out of names as everyone got up to head towards their dorms. 


End file.
